[246] Many of these letters were promptly responded to, and in some instances voluntary tenders of service were made by chiefs discontented with the Barukzye rule. Among others, Khan Shereen Khan, chief of the Kuzzilbashes, wrote to Shah Soojah declaring his intention to join his standard. “Since we have been so unfortunate,” said the chief, “as to be far from your royal household, it is only known to God how wretchedly we pass our days. We have now resolved, as soon as the troops of your Majesty arrive on the frontier, to lose no time in waiting upon your Majesty and proving our fidelity by sacrificing ourselves in your service. For God’s sake do not make this letter public.” Even before it was known that there was any intention on the part of the Shah to attempt to regain his kingdom, many of the chiefs, either offended by Dost Mahomed’s alliance with the Persians, or warned by the failure of Burnes’s Mission of the danger of clinging any longer to a falling house, wrote to the Shah, beseeching him to return. “The faggots,” it was said, “are ready. It merely requires the lighted torch to be applied.” It is remarkable that one of the first to tender his services to the Suddozye Prince was that very Abdoollah Khan, Achetzkye, who was the prime mover of the insurrection at Caubul, which brought about the restoration of the Barukzyes.—[Captain Wade to Mr. Macnaghten, June 5th, 1838: MS. Records.] At this time the Shah was restricted from corresponding with his Afghan friends; but Captain Wade, whilst reporting to government the receipt of the letters from Abdoollah Khan and others, recommended that the restriction should be removed. The Shah seems to have laid before the British agent, in perfect good faith, all the letters he received from Afghanistan whilst a pensioner on the British Government.
[247] Mr. Macnaghten to Government, July 17, 1838: MS. Records.
[248] It was, as I have shown, the first wish of the Governor-General that the Sikhs should undertake, single-handed, the invasion of Afghanistan (see Lord Auckland’s Minute and instructions to Mr. Macnaghten in the preceding chapter). Macnaghten, on his way to Runjeet’s Court, wrote to Mr. Masson: “You will have heard that I am proceeding on a mission to Runjeet Singh; and as at my interview with his Highness it is probable that the question of his relations with the Afghans will come on the tapis, I am naturally desirous of obtaining the opinion of the best-informed men with respect to them. Would you oblige me, therefore, by stating what means of counteraction to the policy of Dost Mahomed Khan you would recommend for adoption; and whether you think that the Sikhs, using any (and what?) instrument of Afghan agency, could establish themselves in Caubul?”—[Masson’s Narrative, vol. iii.] A letter, with a similar suggestion, was sent to Captain Burnes, of whose reception of the project I shall speak more in detail. The matter is further noticeable as an indication of the unwillingness of Lord Auckland to interfere more actively in the politics of Afghanistan.
[249] In this revised edition of the present work, I am bound to state that Mr. Henry Torrens, whose early death, in 1852, is an event to be deplored far beyond the circle of his own private friends, emphatically denied, on reading these statements, and the comments made upon them by the local press of India, his participation in the evil counsels which led Lord Auckland astray. I am bound to give currency to Mr. Torrens’s explanations, which will be found in the Appendix to the present volume, with such comments of my own as they seem to demand.
[250] Mr. Masson says (Narrative, vol. iii., p. 495) that Burnes told him that the expedition across the Indus “had been arranged before he reached Simlah, and that when he arrived Torrens and Colvin came running to him and prayed him to say nothing to unsettle his Lordship; that they had all the trouble in the world to get him into the business, and that even now he would be glad of any pretext to retire from it.” I was for a long time, very sceptical of the truth of this story; and I do not now vouch for it. But I know that some men, with far better opportunities than my own of determining the authenticity of the anecdote, are inclined to believe it.
[251] Runjeet was very anxious to obtain Burnes’s private opinion regarding the state of politics in Afghanistan, and the course which it was expedient for the Maharajah to adopt. The Fakir Noor-ood-deen had two or three conferences with Burnes upon these points. The whole history of the negotiations with Dost Mahomed were gone over and reported, from notes taken down at the time, by the Fakir to the Maharajah. Runjeet declared himself very grateful for this information; and sent again to ask Burnes to tell him, not as a public functionary, but as a private friend, whether the restoration of Shah Soojah would be really to his advantage. Burnes’s answer was in the affirmative; and Runjeet seems to have been, to some extent, influenced by it.—[Captain Burnes to Mr. Macnaghten, Lahore, June 20th, 1838: MS. Records.] I do not know whether this letter has ever been made public from any private source. Like almost everything else relating to the proceedings at Lahore and Loodhianah in June and July, 1830, it was studiously suppressed by government.
[252] To Mr. Macnaghten, June 2, 1838.
[253] Burnes had originally written, “Of Shah Soojah-ool-Moolk, personally, I have, that is as ex-King of the Afghans, no very high opinion;” but he had scored out the words. I quote the passages in the text from a copy, the accuracy of which is certified by two Justices of the Peace at Bombay. This letter was cited by Sir John Hobhouse in the House of Commons, in verification of the assertion that Burnes had recommended the course adopted by Lord Auckland. That I may not be myself accused of garbling, I give the letter entire in the Appendix.
[254] With reference to the final offers of Dost Mahomed to hold Peshawur, conjointly with Sultan Mahomed, tributary to Lahore (Jebbar Khan acting as the Ameer’s representative), Captain Wade wrote: “They seem to be in some accordance with the overture made by Runjeet Singh to Dost Mahomed before Captain Burnes’s arrival at Caubul, as reported in my despatch of the 8th of August last, and appear, as far as I can judge of them at present, to be more reasonable than his former overtures, though the Maharajah’s opinion of their operation on the Peshawur branch of the family remains to be disclosed. I am ready, with the sanction of the Governor-General, to communicate the proposition now made to Runjeet Singh, and to support by every argument that I can use the expediency of its acceptance by him.”—[Captain Wade to Mr. Macnaghten, March 3, 1838.]
[255] Captain Wade to Mr. Macnaghten: MS. Records. Captain Wade’s letters have been garbled almost as shamelessly as Captain Burnes’s.